Bruce Mims, Ed.D

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Bruce Mims – Publications

"Fixing California Public School Finance"
Under Review
Authors: Bruce Mims, Ed.D
This publication in submission and under review is a historical and positional paper examining the inequities in K12 California public school finance--pre Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF). It offers a plausibles "adequacy-based" solutions to the dilemma that depicts the inequities of funding across the K12 public school landscape--that LCFF still ceases to address or remedy.Social Capital, Institutional Agency, Minority or Low-Status Youth Empowerment, and AVID Implementation (Doctoral Dissertation)
University of Southern CaliforniaAugust 2007
Authors: Bruce Mims, Ed.D
This study isolated the salience of institutional agency within the context of a specific intervention program called, Advancement via Individual Determination (AVID), an untracking program designed to help low achieving students elicit academic success.

Four primary research questions guided the study. First, to the degree those efforts to engage in social capital mobilization are made, how might the program coordinator’s accessible social capital play a prominent role? Second, to what extent are AVID program coordinators able to mobilize their social capital to convey information, resources, and opportunities to minority and low-status youth in the context of program implementation? Third, what factors facilitate or constrain the accumulation of accessible social capital and agency-oriented mobilization of social capital (on behalf of program participants and/or program implementation)? Finally, to what extent does AVID training identify the underpinning theoretical concepts and processes of social capital theory; thus do AVID program coordinators understand their role relative to the help-seeking and network-seeking orientations of institutional agency?"No Child Left Behind: Teaching, Learning, and the Pathway from There to Here"
Submitted 2/20/2014 (under review)
Authors: Bruce Mims, Ed.D
“No Child Left Behind: Teaching, Learning, and the Pathway from There to Here” is a critical reflection regarding the state of public education; in the wake of 12 years of unsubstantiated or unrealized learning outcomes within the scope, context, and climate that has depicted the detrimental nature of all things related to “No Child Left Behind” (NCLB). The articulation also ponders the nature of essential 21st century pedagogy as many states ponder the shift from NCLB to Common Core State Standards (CCSS). The final segment of this piece is a case study based on the personal interfaces and experiences of the author, relative to his own child, culminating in essential food for thought pertaining to concerns about the quality and effectiveness of teaching, learning, and pedagogy in terms of the big picture; at this crossroads between NCLB and CCSS.